Brave, New World
by hbautista628
Summary: The fight is about to begin once more... hours after the Legionnaires prevented the Zero Point from occurring, it seemed as though, the world would be at peace once more. However, deep in the shadows, lays a plot orchestrated by one individual, who will bring chaos to an already tarnished world exhausted by the wars that took place.
1. The End of Life

A/N: The following is a partial reboot of the original story that I originally put up that covers the aftermath of the final showdown from season 9. Act 1 will focus on Jennifer Hawkins destroying the sea monster, while Act 2 will be more of a crossover.

A/N on January 22nd, 2020: Has been heavily updated to reimagine the world that I choose to depict. The text's been heavily altered to make way for additional changes...

OCTOBER 11th, 0245 HRS ZULU TIME

1LT JENNIFER "PARADIGM" HAWKINS – DUSTY DEPOT ROCKET LAUNCH FACILITY – 4 KMS EAST OF SNOBBY SHORES

Today was supposed to be the the day the Federation and all the others were cease to exist under the plans we were forced to conduct. During this stertorous period, almost everybody we knew had to make a lot of sacrifices in order to seal the fate of both worlds: Earth and Aquarius. And our mission, was to launch a missile to destroy the portal that connected both of our planets against both Atlas and the Federation, destroy the rift beacon and activation zones and kill the man who orchestrated all of this.

I don't remember the exact details as to how it all happened right after the Zero Point; but it was certain that under that period, many of our closest allies that we once knew, would never make it out alive. And that occurred the same time, the Galilean V-91-3MDD would strike the core, and create two alternate worlds. One belonged to earth, and the other to ours, since this technology would be gathered by both organizations and subsequently another two: ALTER and EGO.

It all started in the middle of a vague night, when much of our planet came under fire as a result of a third war that took place during our search of these beacons. And during that brief, yet intense war, many of our brothers and sisters were lost trying to protect each other from our former allies and enemies; but even if we suffered heavy losses, trying to protect ourselves, we couldn't trust no one, not even Atlas. Everybody feared that this planet would be prone to a number of wars that would eventually follow, even if we failed.

This time, however, we ensured to ourselves that our world we lived would thrive without the use of the Federation, since they were the mongols, the nomads to be exact, and unleashed hell for a certain amount of time. But if we failed, then these hypothetical wars would come to fruition and unleash hell amongst all people and bring about, the Apocalypse...

"Lieutenant," said the Scientist.

"Go ahead," I replied.

"You already know where all of this has led us to, yes?"

"Wilco."

"All right. I'll be giving you a recap on what we're planning in order to save the planet from oblivion. Although we lost many of our men gathering sufficient information, it's time that we prevent the Zero Point from happening. For Operation: Evangelion, we need you, if not, all of us, have to cooperate together, and fend off both Federation and Atlas forces in destroying the beacon that we created through the devices that we've gather over the span of 3 months; there is a possibility that the Catalyst, may either intervene and allow this to happen or come an support us."

"I'm uncertain that she'll make it."

"What do you mean?"

"They've captured her."

"So that means..."

"We're on our own."

"Regardless if the Catalyst's our ally, then we need to proceed as planned, since the data Kaitlyn gave to me a few days earlier matches the exact data that everybody gathered." interrupted the Visitor.

"Activate the beacon, and this will effectively prevent the Zero Point from happening. But listen. Closely. When the timer reaches zero, we'll simultaneously launch the missile that we built out of the same materials we gathered during the previous attempt while you activate the beacons. That way, we'll effectively destroy the portal and ensure that their plans stop. We only have one chance in making this happen. If we screw this up, then it's all over. We're counting on you, Sentinels. Good luck!"

"Understood."

Sasha provided overwatch while the rest of the Sentinels, the MEF pilot and I fortified our defenses across the depot.

"Is everything good to go?" I asked to Sasha.

"да" Sasha replied in Russian, "Everything's good to go."

"All right. Hana, right?"

"That's right," she said, "So, are you sure that this is going to work?"

"We can't take any chances at the moment," I said, "It's now or never."

"Here comes the Federation," said one of the Sentinels, "There's Atlas as well."

"We're right on schedule," I said, "Get everything set up. Sasha and the rest of the Sentinels will be equipping some of the enemy uniforms, while Hana and I will finalize the defenses."

"Got it," said Sasha.

While everybody else readied their defenses and waited for the convoy to arrive, I equipped my Paradigm power suit that was given by the Legionnaires and helmet, while the MEF pilot climbed onboard her mech. Knowing that this was going to be a tough battle, I knew that the two of us would have to stay back and activate the beacons. It lasted for some 15 minutes for both forces to arrive. I thought to myself that if this was going to work out, then I knew damn well I be a hero in saving the entire fucking world.

One by one, tanks and transport vehicles from both sides arrived, and the Sentinels quickly chose their target silently, as they grabbed their RPGs. They then later opened fire and destroyed one of the transport vehicles. The Federation later returned fire, and I could see dozens of infantrymen storming their way through the hangar.

A few minutes passed, and the Atlas forces arrived, and the Federation intervened to take out the convoy that was sent. Once the two had engaged, this allowed us for more time to finalize the rocket launch. It was hellish, since I could see several soldiers lay dead on the ground covered in, regardless if they were our allies or not, along with the bullets flying near us and screams of the soldiers as they were shot or kept pushing forward to take out their adversaries.

I could later hear the radio chatter coming in from all teams, as I could hear the Sentinels telling the others to fall back, while the Federation telling their allies to keep pushing, as I heard it from a two-way radio coming through a dead soldier.

I then heard an explosion coming in through the blast doors from the converted rocket launch facility, and stormed their way trough the launch room. Just as I could see dozens of soldiers coming in, Hana and I made our last stand in taking out both forces, as this was more of a free for all that pitted every single force into each other.

"Gateway, Gateway" exclaimed one of the Sentinels, "Multiple Federation and Atlas infantrymen are storming in to your position. I say again, multiple foot soldiers are converging their way to the control room. They're going to prevent it once they get you, do you copy?!"

"Shit, what now?" asked Hana.

"We have no choice," I replied to her, "All Sentinels, this is Gateway. We've confirmed both infantrymen from both sides making their way towards the control room. I say again enemy forces have been spotted near our AO. All allied forces are advised to hold up as much as you can, while the missile approaches the rift portal. Out!"

"Roger your last," said one of the Sentinels.

"Lieutenant," he frantically called my name multiple times, "Are you sure we're going to make it out alive?"

"We can. Don't worry." I replied. "It has been an honor to serve with you Sergeant. If we don't make it and get engulfed by the black hole that we predicted, then pray for everybody seek for forgiveness."

"Yes, ma'am."

I ran towards the control room with Hana, while we desperately ran as fast as we could, trying to dodge all the bullets that fired at us while Hana used some of her defensive mechanisms to protect us in order to make it towards the control substation. I was frantic enough to see an erroneous Scientist, thinking that we've died during one of the explosions by one of the demolition men. The three of us ran cover from cover to try and find the Visitor, who we weren't able to see.

"Paradigm," said the Scientist, "What happened to my bastard accomplice?!"

"I don't know where he is," I exclaimed while some of the bullets ricochet all over the computers, "Besides, here's too many of them! I can't risk it losing any of our friends..."

"I'm sorry," he replied, "I sympathize your remarks, but listen to me. If the missile doesn't strike the core, then we are DONE FOR! Do it!"

I was reluctant on pushing the button, since I feared that this was going to go towards the wrong direction. But upon looking at everybody that I knew or never met get shot at or desperately telling them to stop firing, it was enough for me to get up and throw a grenade or so to create a diversion, so that I could press the button.

"Ok."

I rushed over to where the keys were that controlled the Zero Point and pressed the button to open the already-floating portal and see the missile being launched by the air thanks to them, and everybody gazed into the air, thinking that we we've done was over. The missile that we built blasted off and subsequently disappeared into the night sky. Thinking that the operation succeeded, I later looked at the sky once more, only to see the missile reappear once again, as quadruplets started appearing elsewhere, and it effectively warped the meteor from affecting us, since it was the same object that forever changed both worlds.

Just as I thought we succeeded and later began to celebrate, a frag grenade was tossed by one of the grunts and it hit the visor, thus damaging some of the core functions it had to protect me. Although the strength of the blast was enough to throw me about a few feet back, the armor that came saved my life, but the sheer explosion would instantly knock me out in the process, thus rendering the others to believe I was dead. Upon laying on the ground, thinking about what had really just happened, I heard the screams of all the soldiers from all sides saying and kneeling to the ground that the fight was over, and that we pray for ourselves to live on.

All the while this was happening, what had impacted me the most was the way that everybody stopped firing their guns and started looking at each other, trying to understand what they're actually witnessing, while some had fired at each other, trying to storm their way inside and prepare to upload the abort keys. There was one person that was serious enough, that he actually tried to upload the abort codes, only to find that it was too late to be inputted.

As I slowly got back up and saw what was left, the meteor eventually made its impact directly at the portal, which sustained minimal damage. But it wasn't until the missile that we launched would be accompanied by another 6 coming from other facilities across the world, and it made its impact towards it. Upon seeing the explosion personally, it was enough for to be destroyed, that the planet's mass and core started to lose its density. And it was because of that, everybody that I knew started to float freely at zero gravity. Knowing that there was nothing else to do, but witness the death of our planet, I embraced with Hana one last time, and screamed out, "God help us all!" before everything that we knew and shared would cease to exist.

Our actions would be enough to destroy the Federation and Atlas, but what I wouldn't expect at all, was the formation of a new planet; let alone, live in an alternate version of our exact same planet or so...


	2. Brave, New World

**Update on January 22, 2020: **The entire transcript has been heavily edited in order to reflect with the conclusion of the first chapter, now that Chapter 2: Season 1's about to come to a close.

**BRAVE, NEW WORLD**

**OCTOBER 15, 0650 HRS ZULU TIME – VALLEJO ISLAND**

**JENNIFER "PARADIGM" HAWKINS**

When I opened my eyes, overlooking at the blue sky that brewed into the bright sun and beyond, all I could think about was if Hana and I, along with the rest of my fellow Sentinels, succeeded in stopping both the Federation and Atlas from doing the unthinkable. I may fully understand as to the risks the two organizations had to face at the time, but it was certain that Aquarius was going to experience the Zero Point, now that the world we left behind was fully destroyed by the unbinding forces that made this happen.

What I never expected was anything that I never seemed to imagine. What was once the pitch darkness that was there had seemingly disappeared, and came through was the beginning of a new era. I wasn't sure where to begin with, let alone, find the others that seemingly disappeared into the darkness.

"Where… where am I?" I asked while I was standing and took off my helmet, "Where's everybody at?"

Upon standing up and looking across an individual island overlooking a beach town, I picked up any remaining equipment, including the HB50 that Hana gave to me, ammunition, a FAMAS F1 Valorise, and my backpack that was found right beside palm tree, to begin my search for any survivors.

I kept wandering across the island before I found a boat that took me to that specified beach town, I encountered Hana looking at the body of Yuna, laying unconscious on the ground, maybe dead after sustaining massive wounds from the shrapnel that flew over the facility before engulfing life as we know it. It wasn't long after that she was mourning the loss of her best friend and sat on the ground, looking hopeless that nobody else could've survived the impact, before I looked at her through a distance and called out her name a few times before recognizing me.

"Oh my god!" exclaimed Hana while she gave out a hug, "I thought you were dead!"

There was something strange about her, given that a normal teenager or daughter would act in the first place. I just know that there must be some sort of secret that she's hiding. I just don't know if the loss of Yuna will certainly affect us, but given that we've been through the worst, ever since we first met after the destruction that ensued back in Busan, it's certain that she could finally rest, and live off to tell her tale, maybe. But even if her friends, too, have been through the worst as well, I never expected to form a mutual relationship between Hana and her friends to begin with. Better yet, I just don't know about Talon and the others doing their part to keep the world in check.

"Everything's all right now," I responded, while I solemnly hugged her, "Everything's going to be all right."

After she stopped hugging me, I felt an unusually strong force starting to take over me, as Hana started becoming desperate about something or someone that she also forgot about in the first place. Without hesitation, I assured to her everything was going to be all right, and that it was only the two of us, alone in the dark, to try and find the rest of our friends, now that we were all alone.

"Hey, Hana," I said, "Do you know what happened to Dae-hyun and the rest of the others?"

"I..." she replied sorrowly. "I don't know where he is right now."

"Well... well, why don't we look for them and see if they're somewhere across town or someplace else?"

Hana didn't answer back, and instead showed me what was left of Yuna, who was washed ashore and laid there like a hopeless animal. I wasn't sure where to begin with, or what to do, since I didn't have the proper equipment to show that she was all right. Because of my hesitation to check if she was dead, I wanted to assure myself and Hana that she was going to have to make it out alive somehow, now that everything that we had back at the capital ship was likely engulfed by the Zero Point that we created overall.

"Is she all right?" I asked to her.

"I don't know if she is okay." she replied. "I just know that she's not breathing or something..."

"Do you want me to check on her?"

"If she is, then please do so."

"Hooah."

I lifted Yuna up and later placed her in a stable position and later placed my two fingers over each artery to ensure if she was alive or not. The procedure lasted for about five minutes or so, but to no avail. I initially thought that I must've done it incorrect or so; and for that, I repeated this process multiple times, before finally, I would discover her pulse to be critical and asked anybody for help. We kept waiting and waiting for about a few minutes or so on the eve of rush hour; and finally, there was a medic nearby, who wore casual attires, and asked for help.

"Hey!" I exclaimed at the woman. "I need help! My friend's dying!"

Immediately, the person made her way to where we were and administered first aid, before I decided to ask her about who she was.

"Who are you?" I asked to her. "It seems that you must be in the military, and attained a medical degree."

"Thanks." she replied. "What about you? Are you affiliated with EGO or ALTER?"

"I don't know about them. What about you?"

"Me? Well, I no longer work for the military, but I'm working instead at a nearby hospital. If you want, I can take care of your friend, and inform you about how she's doing."

"Thank you." responded Hana. "Thank you."

"No problem. If anything, I'll let you know about your friend."

Eventually, the medic left and took Yuna to the hospital, before it was just the two of us again, waiting to see or do to find the rest of the others. Throughout the rest of the morning, we left town and started searching across the island, looking for answers as to where the Visitor and Scientist were. Slowly as we progressed deep into the mainland, there was an abandoned facility that contained ammo caches and a number of logistical data that must've been gathered from a long time ago by the time we entered.

Upon gazing at a number of documents surrounding about the same organizations that the medic was talking about, I felt skeptical if she really was a part of either organizations. Regardless, none of the documents contained any data containing the origins, records and combat data gathered from the Federation or Atlas. Then, there was something else that bothered me. If we really did stop them, then what organizations have replaced the two? That is what I wanted to seek overall, before Hana was surprised to see the Scientist overlooking at some of the documents that belonged to one of the organizations along with the Visitor.

"Jennifer! Hana!" exclaimed the Scientist. "It's good to see you guys!"

"You too." Hana replied. "What are you looking at?

"Me? Well, I've been with the Visitor all morning, declassifying some documents detailing the Federation and Atlas."

"What's going on?" I asked at the Scientist, while I was looking at some of the documents that I inspected.

"Well, it appears that all the databases containing info about the Federation and Atlas have seemingly disappeared, following upon activating the rift zones across each part of the continent," replied the Visitor, "And it was there, that the Zero Point had fully activated, and consumed all forms of life. Because of this, there's been a strange anomaly taking place."

"You're not even serious about this, are you?" he asked.

"Precisely. I believe that the only reason why this place still exists is because the timeline has been altered, thus the changes made in the past must've prevented the formation of the two. Not only that, but with the Federation and Atlas not existing, its certain there are two groups that may have taken this role, since according to some of the documents that I uncovered, we're technically living in the present day."  
"But is there any twist to it?" asked Hana.

"Correct. The only thing that's been intriguing me the most is the fact that these number of technologies and innovations the made had seemingly disappeared. However, there are some that left Aquarius as early as the moment we warned everybody about the impending threat that was about to happen. And when the Zero Point occurred, that is when all forms of life had fully extinguished and what thus ended was an age of darkness, and in came a new era of peace. It's only now, that I realized the toll on each and every one of you. We lost a lot of good men and women in the process."

"Aye... do you actually know about everything that you'd experienced during the black hole?" I asked at the Visitor.

"I don't know." replied the Visitor before making a brief pause. "Wait, I did see everyone float in space, and later teleport back to Earth two days after this had finally settled. Thankfully, everybody but those that were caught in the crossfire were killed. Eventually, I had to call in the Sequential Justice to teleport everybody inside the ship, so that the medical staff could provide medical attention to those that were wounded."

"But wait!" I said. "If the Sequential Justice managed to survive, then what did it contain?"

"The ship contained all the data necessary to embark to any other place," said the Scientist, "But we originally planned to deliberately crash it on the ground and burn all the equipment from the others exploiting this and having it reverse-engineered. But instead, it was necessary for us that we would have to contact one of the organizations to well, use this on a consumer-scale."

"As for the crew," interrupted the Visitor, "many of you were able to make it out alive, thanks to gene therapy being utilized to allow everybody the ability to breathe within the shores of our galaxy and swim through deep space, and also to prevent mass levels of radiation flowing through your bodies."

"But now that Aquarius has been destroyed, do you think that will we ever return to Earth?" asked Hana.

"Technically, Aquarius is supposed to no longer exist." He replied. "Although the ship has the coordinates to return to Earth, we feel that the recent timeline may have altered as far as 40 years."

"In other words, all of this took place before Orchard being implemented following the end of an unnamed war that didn't involve neither Atlas or the Federation." revealed the Scientist. "If the two of you want, you can fetch us more documents to us or you can find something else to pass the time."

"Got it."

Upon waiting for the Scientist to find and uncover documents surrounding the databases of all identification papers followed by war documents, I was increasingly worried about Sasha and went on to look for him with Hana following me. Noting that he disappeared right after the activation of all the rift zones across the planet and subsequently led to the destruction of all forms of life, I kept searching across the facility for clues before telling Hana that I needed some time off to find out the truth about his disappearance. The long and arduous search lasted for about an hour and a half, and there was no sign of him whatsoever. Feeling that he moved somewhere else long before I even woke up, it wasn't until I learned the truth when I uncovered a note that stated my name in an encased envelope. In the small note that he wrote, it took me a while to verify the truth, as realized that this sounded serious. In it, he stated that Sasha was not happy about the choices he made back at the time, and stated that he wanted to be with me once more, but had to make the ultimate choice in sacrificing his life to destroy the same force that has long threatened the world for so long, and his wasn't in vain and wanted to ensure the downfall of the organization, before stating that the remainder of us must preserve the good name of Atlas and a new organization that we must create to ensure the future of this new world.

Simultaneously heartbroken about his death, I screamed in agony, cursing the Federation for what they did to him along with Atlas, and was engulfed by this surge of fury. However, I somehow managed to wander across the shoreline before sitting on the shoreline and have Hana stand right besides me. I waded for a minute or so, looking at the crisp ocean distract me from all the pain that I went through before she intervened.

"What's wrong, Jennifer?" Hana asked to me.

"It's Sasha." I replied.

"Is he-"

"Dead. I don't know what to do without him. If only... if only if I had spared more of my time to be with him overall, then maybe things would've gone a different turn."

"I see. It's like me a while ago, when I thought Yuna was actually going to die. *Later looks at me and softly smiles at me.* Look, you've been there with me, when things were dire. It was you that motivated me to go further, and feel good about what I do all the time; but it hates me to see you like this."

"Thanks for your concern, Hana. But... *gives out a deep sigh* but I've also made some of the worst choice, just because of my ego, which let me to forget about the others and focus on the mission. Maybe if I took a more relaxed approach, then none of this would've happened."

"Either way, it was going to be inevitable. Many lives were saved and lost simultaneously because of this. *looks at me* It wasn't your fault that this happened. Life happens like this all the time. We just don't know if one of us are next. Better yet, I wonder how Yuna's doing..."

*gives out another deep sigh* Me too. I just hope that she makes it out okay."

"You said it. There's a nearby memorial we can head to. Do you think it'd be a good idea to pay respects?"

"Sure thing."

I briefly stood up and followed her towards the boat that she talked about, before she fired up the engine and sailed towards the small island that housed the ruins. Upon arriving towards at the site, I was mesmerized by the way it looked, when the two of us looked at a desolate fort or outpost that showed its age, when battle scars and a number of holes and debris were uncovered through this land. Surrounded by it, were a number of cannons emplaced across the island, showcasing that a previous battle may have occurred a long time ago.

"Wait!" exclaimed Hana. "What is that?"

While the two of us continued to explore the remains of this isolated island for another 10 minutes, Hana found what it appeared to be an old helmet that must've made its way here, before she gave the helmet to me and booted up its OS for a while. Upon initializing its OS and a number of software updates, I realized that the helmet must've belonged to me, given that I forgot to take it with me following the forged alliance that I made with the Legionnaires themselves and said, "That was the helmet that I forgot to bring with me!" before I took off my current helmet off and back on the old one to bring back a number of memories back before the days that led to the showdown between us and the creature. Knowing that I wouldn't drop it on the ground, I decided to take off the old helmet and placed it in my backpack along with the current one, before I loaded both the HB50 that Hana gave to me and my F1 Valorise taken from the armory.

Hana looked onwards, as I fired my rifle up in the air as a show of respect before I pulled the safety pin of my gun and saluted to those that weren't able to make it out alive.

**1 hour later...**

Upon reentering the computer room after returning from the long trip, I looked at a happier Visitor and Scientist, who normally didn't have any signs of emotions but seemed to be in a good mood, now that there was nothing else to do, besides in finding the rest of the others across the place. I somehow looked at the Scientist, who had a suspicious feeling as to what was next in the future; it wasn't until Hana would debunk everything that he was thinking about.

"So guys, what do you want to do?" Hana asked around, "There's nothing else we can do besides in exploring around."

"She's right," I said, "We could maybe find the rest of the others, who've been missing for a good while. Maybe with that, we can forge new alliances that we may not even not about."

"That's true," replied the Scientist, "We could need some new allies, so that we can improve the relations of the others, now that they've been extinguished."

"All right!" I shouted in excitement. "But first, let's make sure everything's tweaked to its maximum level, including our guns and remaining supplies."

"That's true. But you do know that Aquarius has been transformed into a different place, right?" Interrupted the Visitor.

I started to smile for a while, and looked upon the rising clouds that formed outside of where the outpost resided. Thinking that if this really was going to be a rough world out there, I came to terms in accepting where I was, so that I could try and focus on the future and not look back to the past that much; but because of the deaths of the others, I made an oath to myself that I would have to honor their memories that the others undertook during the third war.

"Oh, what the hell…" *we all laugh* All right, let's get started."

Although there weren't any vehicles that we could use, I decided to take off my helmet once more, so that I could get some much-needed fresh air that I haven't had in a while. While on our way to a forest located west to where we were, I noticed a number of people already going on with their busy lives, as it seemed to them that nothing had actually happened overall. However, given that a number of surreal events was about to take place, I kept my HB50 and FAMAS inside unassembled and directly concealed the two inside my backpack, in case if this was actually going to happen. By the time we arrived at the forest, my mind was blown away for the first time in a while, as I never expected it to be as lifeless as it could get overall.

"This place is so beautiful!" exclaimed Hana while she took a picture of the landscape from her phone, "This is the first time that I've seen this! It looks fantastic!"

"What do you think, Hana?" I asked her, gleefully.

"Now this is where the beauty starts!" she exclaimed, "Say, let's take a selfie, will you?"

"Um… I'm not sure if I've done this before and -"

"Oh relax! Just smile at the camera, and it's all good!"

"All right."

After Hana and I took a selfie, I went down to a lake to take a good shower in order to get some privacy out of all the others. Upon looking over the horizon, I noticed a glare coming from a hillside coming about several hundred metres from where the glare had caught my eyes. I was initially confused if the glare was emanating from a vehicle or so, but it appeared to me that it could've been a sniper, once I realized that the glare did come from a rifle scope. Worried for a moment that it was the Federation, I wielded out the HB50 and later made my way to where the sniper was. However, the person didn't even pull the trigger down in the first place; I somehow felt a bit strange if it was going to be a dead end. About a few minutes in, I kept moving closer to where the glare emanated by sprinting through the traverse woodlands and winding rivers that affected the place.

And it wasn't long after, that I found the person who deliberately aimed at my head through its laser sight and glare coming from her sniper rifle. Upon looking at the female pink-haired individual, who appeared to be wearing and possessing rock-climbing equipment, I somehow felt suspicious as to whether or not, she was the same person that I spotted sometime before the Zero Point had even occurred.

"Who are you?" I asked at her, while slowly putting her SV-98 on the ground and demanding her to raise her hands.

"Me?" she replied with a smiley grin in her face. "Neither enemy nor friend."

I unconcealed my HB50 and frisked her equipment, in order to ensure that she was not affiliated with the Federation before she went on to stand up and explain to me about everything that I didn't know about.

"You see," she continued, "I'm not affiliated with the Federation, nor Atlas in the first place.

"If not, then are you somehow allied with the Legionnaires?"

"I belong to an organization called the Expedite Global Operations team; and for years, we've provided exact information about the Federation's own findings, and delivered that intel to the Visitor of yours."  
"You mean..."

"I played a part in helping you guys out for a while. And if it wasn't for me, then this petty war that you were supposed to engage in would've lasted for a while, thanks to the construction of 7 Rift Beacons capable of transmitting its signal to the energy station from where the battle of yours had occurred. If you want, we can talk about this tomorrow in the morning."

A helicopter suddenly flew overhead of the two of us, and shortly landed before the pilots and the rest of the squad waited for her to climb aboard and return to where they came from. However, I was roughly able to identify one of the people that were onboard, and I was shocked to see the same person be a part of the squad that the person commanded. With the roaring engine pounding through the ground like a tropical storm, I was unsure where we were going to meet or even find a good place and talk about it overall. It was then, that I decided to ask her about a few things before she left.

"Where are we going to meet?" I asked before she boarded the helicopter.

With the deafening sounds coming from the engine, I couldn't hear a single thing or so before the person came closer and replied, "The cabins, to where we resided." before the helicopter took off and flew away, thus returning a fresh bit of air followed by nature slowly reclaiming her calm and peacefulness.

I waited about a few minutes thereafter, when the Visitor had finally arrived, followed by everybody that came. I was initially skeptical if what she said was true, given that my credentials towards him was nearly as loose. Therefore, I was extremely pissed off (loosely), but straightforward, I wanted to go through the serenity of my clouded mind and immediately talk about a deal we were all forced to sign with.

"What's wrong, Jennifer?" started asking the Visitor.

"There's nothing wrong." I replied with a disgruntled face. "I just wanted to ask about one thing."

"Go ahead."

"Have you signed us all a deal with someone to do their dirty work?"

Quickly, the Visitor started to blush for a bit, followed by a surge of movements occurring over his body in order to convince us he was saying the truth. He kept looking around, waiting for someone, including Hana and the Scientist, to say something to back him up. Unfortunately, they too, became skeptical about him. This lasted about a few seconds before he went on to admit it to all of us.

*long sigh* "Unfortunately, yes." he replied disgustedly. "Why is that?"

"Technically, one of your agents coming from some organization called EGO, said that you were affiliated, and told us about a mission that we're planning to partake in, is that true?"

"Wait! W-who told you that?!" *face changes from disgusted to shocked*

"I told you just now. It was a pink-hair-ished person wearing rock climbing equipment that told me about it. Could you try and clarify their intentions?"

"All right, then; Jesus!" he concluded in an annoying manner. "About a few days before the Zero Point had occurred, I made contact with one of the agents stationed in Singapore for a meeting between EGO and ASEAN delegates in regards of our actions that were being made that threatened the existence of our two planets, before concluding that the two would create a strategic alliance between them, followed by the Arab League and the Galilean Association of Unified Nations."

"That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the mission that she was talking about."

"I'm sorry, but I'm trying to get through this as well! Just don't rush me through all this. *brief pause* Ahem, as I was saying, after the meeting, the agent went on to personally talk to me about a mission that they needed help on the most. It's with another organization called ALTER, I believe, and they've been running up tensions between the two in an effort to gain power and become a stronghold in a newly-formed Aquarius."

"You're wrong!" interrupted the Scientist. "It's only now that I realized that Aquarius still exists."

"What?"

"The only reason why the planet still exists is because someone or something must've been aware of the premonition that we've lived through over the past. Perhaps it must've been them that eliminated the top figures from the two. *Brief pause and looks away from us* I just don't know if Journey must've used an inter-dimensional rift to head back in time and kill them..."

"Wait!" I paused for a moment and awkwardly pointed at him, morally becoming suspicious over what he did during our previous mission. What I got instead was a question that was ready to be put in motion that converted itself as a suspicion over his loyalty to us or to them. I should've known by the fact that something strange had truly been occurring at that time.

"You son of a bitch!" I exclaimed at him. "You knew this was going to happen, didn't you?!"

"What did we do wrong?" frantically asked Hana. "Are they going to come back?"

"Yes." he hastily replied. "As I aforementioned earlier, it was necessary for this conversation that I had with one of their agents to be confidential."

"Do you realize that you're putting us into a grave situation now, don't you?"

"Come on now, guys." interrupted the Scientist. "Let's calm down, everybody. We don't need to settle this down with a fistfight. Now I know it wasn't the right thing that my accomplice did the worst choice in letting you know about this pesky little secret that we knew about during the previous mission. But Jennifer, we can settle this down another day, once this little errand that the others need has been fully arranged, alright?"

I hesitated for a moment and I felt sympathetic to what the Scientist offered to me, since I know that the two are great people, but I was weary to what he's done over the previous months and perhaps years past. Yet, even if I was unaware to their actions done earlier, it's starting to bind together and weave itself to make a sweater needed for winter.

"Acknowledged." I said towards him. "Even if we're on good terms, including the Visitor himself, I need to know about this as soon as possible. 'Cause if there's anyone that's getting the information, then it's gotta be us; and I mean all of us, including Hana and if all, any possible survivors spread throughout the island."

"Very well." the Visitor concluded.

I looked at Hana for a while, while seemingly being worried about something that caught my attention. I wanted to say something, let alone, try and comfort her despite the grueling hardships we faced for a long time. She remained standing there for a while, looking at something or someone lurking underneath before I went on and look at her directly in the eyes shortly after the two returned back to the cabin.

"What's wrong, Hana?" I started asking to her, while she remained looking into the deep horizon. "Has something been bothering you recently?"

It was extremely dull for me to handle a number of things that needed to be taken care of, but things had eventually settled down inside my head, as her eyes started to shine all over the room and I was able to think about the positive sides of life, despite a number of limitations happening across life.

"So, what should we do?" asked Hana while looking around the living room.

"I'm preparing some salmon at the moment," I replied, "I'll let you guys know when dinner's ready!"

"All right," said the Scientist, "We're just finishing up cutting off the tree barks so that we can use it for later."

"I know that it may sound too youngish and everything, but I feel that we all want to get along, and know more about each other, right?"

"Indeed," said the Visitor, "Now that we've got the night to ourselves, why don't we share our experiences before getting to know each other?"

"As I previously mentioned, give some time to finish up with the salmon. I'll let you know when it's ready!"

It took about an hour to finish up with the salmon, while the other 3 were finishing up cleaning up the entire cabin. By the time the salmons were fully cooked, I grabbed the plates that were left over in the kitchen and placed the salmon and added vegetables in order to add some variety and a balanced nutrition for everybody. I guess my cooking skills did help out, since my parents taught me how to cook.

I told everyone to not eat too quick, and enjoy their food after stripping all of our equipment and changing to regular clothes. As I looked around the table, it seemed though, that everyone actually like the grilled salmon that I made.

"This food's delicious!" exclaimed Hana.

"Jennifer, this actually tastes good," said the Scientist, "I didn't know that you'd be a chef. Where did you learn all of this?"

"To tell you the truth, my mother was a chef, and taught me the basics of what's expected in the kitchen," I replied, "Initially I didn't like cooking, but it wasn't until I reached 15 years old that I started to cook for everybody at the house."

"Nice," said the Visitor, "Maybe you'll be our personal chef. Better yet, just because you are one, maybe I should tell you the things that I haven't eaten in a while…"

"No way, man," I said, "You gotta learn the basics first."

"So, when will I take your own culinary academy?"

"Maybe as soon as we finish exploring the island, and we're good."

"All right!", she said in an excitedly way, "So, who will start?"

"Looks like I'll be the first brave enough to start."

"Very well," said Hana.

"It all started on a bright, and crisp July…"


	3. Operation Swordbreaker (Flashback)

FLASHBACK

OPERATION SWORDBREAKER

3 MONTHS EARLIER

Things weren't always the same, ever since I would be the first, and last person that I would ever witness all of the events that I experienced over the years. If it wasn't the Great Decline that affected the entirety of the human population, it was certain that two organizations, lurking beneath the shadows, had been responsible for a previous war that they engaged in secret about 3 decades ago.

The reason why they chose to fight in that war was because of a single weapon capable of decimating vast arrays of armies and reanimated the victims' corpses; this would, in turn, create the Great Decline. In other words, you get infected once, and you'll die in a few seconds, and you'll instantly become a husk, smasher, or even something worse…

Ironically, this was a futile excuse for these organizations in introducing and improving technologies into the next generation. Yet, at the same time, the world would also see the reconstruction of humanity, thanks to the introduction of a new type of liquid named BluGlo.

BluGlo was a new type of chemical liquid that was invented by Dr. Vinderman in 2024, and it has been Implemented in securing humanity's future, and permanently accelerated weapons research and development in exisiting weapons systems; one of these weapons, alone, was the Type-3 Doggus, nicknamed the "Hoyoki," (looks like a bear), a state-of-the-art mech that was capable in dealing with extraterrestrial and nuclear threats from either the Federation, in case if they broke a peace treaty that was negotiated months before the reconstruction, along with numerous factions that opposed us and the Federation.

Before explaining on what happened on that day, July 20th, my squad, Sasha Alexeev, Chun-hei Haneul, and Anthony Williams, and I, were tasked in eliminating a threat that had long decimated the world for a long time. Originally, it was a prehistoric amphibian reptile, but thanks to both Atlas and the Federation, they unknowingly woke up the animal, thanks to its volatile reactor being activated and the genetic codes provided by the chemical weapons, and it allowed the animal to mutate into what now called: Cattus. In other words, we had a real-life Godzilla that we'd never see coming at all.

Almost everybody of the crew were killed when each of us were sent to different locations in acquiring the data that was needed to activate the beacon alone, but I don't want to talk about it, considering that I'll focus on the battle, itself.

I remembered the four of us being at a hangar that housed the Type-3 Doggus in Mount Shasta, making final preparations in killing Cattus. According to the intel that they gave to us, we were informed that the sea monster would head towards San Francisco, and supposedly, kill off the last of his kind, since we were sent in an earlier operation in killing off a female counterpart.

As I started to look at the Type-3, I thought to myself, 'Look at how huge that thing is! Are we sure that we'll beat Cattus, alone?'

Then, I looked around the hangar for another while, and looked at Sasha, who was my closest friend and ally, thinking if we were going to succeed in killing off the last of Cattus' kind.

"What's wrong," asked Sasha as he looked at the Type-3, "Is there anything wrong happening beside what we're about to do?"

"No," I replied, "It's not because of what we're about to do."

"Then, what is it?" asked Chun-hei.

As I watched the maintenance crew arm up the Doggus, I phased out, thinking about killing off the female Cattus. Every time, when I think about it, all I could feel inside was nothing but pure sadness inside, since the mother were taking care of its children from us; and when we killed it, that made me unstable, and cried when I returned to base. It reminds me of an earlier time, when my mother and I were sent to a prison camp by one of the Federation guards; I could remember the screams of my mother, begging the soldiers to not kill her children. That's how it was in Southern Florida, where I was raised for most of my life.

"Jennifer," said Sasha, "Jennifer!"

I suddenly looked around the hangar, since he placed his arm over my right eye.

"I know," I said, "We need to do this."

I climbed onboard the Type-3 along with my crew. As I did so, I could see dozens of people saluting and cheering at us, for that, the operation was officially going to happen. Final preparations were being made, as Sasha made sure that all hydraulics, weapons, and defense systems were working, as I started powering up the rocket propulsion systems that came inside the engine compartment.

"People," said the commander, "You may already know that we're sailing at a shitstorm; but I wanted to say those who have done tremendous work in making this happen, thank you. Now, let's finish what we've started, and make it back home!"

After the commander's speech, mission control finalized the countdown prep and wished us the best, as the Type-3 took off.

A few minutes had passed once we gained altitude over the distant sky, and already, a flight of F-35s flew right beside us at 18,000 ft., as they escorted us to San Fran, and made sure that the Federation would not do anything stupid.

We remained in the air for nearly an hour, as the four of us looked at the clear skies, along with a batch of clouds that covered the Sierra Nevada. Although it really was a beauty seeing almost what was ahead of others, I couldn't think about anything else but Operation Swordbreaker, along with the children from the female Cattus, who were kept inside a compartment room inside, and were well-fed and not aware of what was to happen.

By the time we arrived at San Francisco, it was a huge mess from the beginning to end, as gunshots were fired upon Cattus, along with a couple of Federation forces, who appeared to go rouge after something went awfully wrong. Perhaps that might've been the wrong orders, or if there was something suspicious happening inside the war room.

"Is there anything wrong, Jennifer?" asked Chun-hei.

"No," I replied, "Why?"  
"Just making sure, now that were in the Bay Area."

"All right, everyone," I said, "There's that son of a bitch that's attacking San Francisco right now. Remember everything that we learned during those months, and we got this!"

Regardless, we entered into battle, while the Cattus was on its rampage across the Bay Area, as we launched a barrage of missiles that directly hit parts of its arms and abdomen, and kept on the offensive until it retaliated by dealing a serious amounts of damage all across the hydraulics system; and for us, well, the sheer impact nearly knocked me out, since I was the closest than the others. A few minutes had later passed, and I wondered where was everybody at, better yet, if we already won or not.

"Someone, wake her up!" said Sasha in the background. I woke up to see a trashed-up cockpit, and everyone doing their part to fight off the reptilian beast before it would deal a death blow to all of us by breaching into the cockpit, and devour all of us.

"Anthony," I said, "Anthony, is that you?"

"Good," said Anthony as he got me up, "Come on, Jen! You've been out cold for a while! We need you back in the game and alive!"

"We can't risk losing you and the city!" said Chun-hei while controlling the weapons systems, "Go and head to the maintenance room to initiate a self-repair protocol. Go!"

I went to the emergency room as they requested, while Cattus was about a few inches away from breaching into the cockpit. I later arrived at the maintenance room, only to see that the entire mech to look like hammered shit, thanks to the loss of the left arm, and additional cosmetic damage that was done, while the Financial District took heavy damage.

Unknowingly, I saw two jets, both of which beared the Federation livery, streak beside me, and fire off a few missiles at one of the tanks, that beared Atlas markings, right before it would fly off into the distant thunder, and never return.

I quickly looked around at the hatch to find an internal computer that thankfully, wasn't destroyed; though, I thought that it was severely damaged thanks to the constant force that was done. It took about a few minutes to access its self-repair protocol, and reboot the components for Doggus to fight once again.

Eventually, the trio regained control, and threw him off before falling to the ground and grabbing the energy that was stored inside the Waterton Energy Facility. Right around the lake, a sword suddenly appeared within the energy storage, and grabbed it by the left arm

Upon grabbing it, all four of us noticed that the sword started to glow all over, once it was removed. Without hesitating if the sword was heavily defective, we decided that it was time to end all this by dealing the final blow.

In those final moments, the male Cattus looked at Doggus directly in the eye, as it could hear the cries from the offsprings, and was instantly killed by the sheer impact of the sword being directed towards the eye.

Knowing that the threat had officially ended, we all celebrated the victory, while the Type-3 stood there, watching over the distance across the Bay Area as it burned and exploded across the city.

However, that victory was short-lived, as a new conflict was about to start, while seeing the two aforementioned Federation jets return to San Francisco, along with an amphibious fleet that are already staging an operation to retake San Francisco.

Seeming that we had no choice, Chun-hei suggested that we leave the atmosphere, fearing that a nuclear exchange could happen at any time. And it was the best decision we made, in order to leave back all the madness that was happening below the surface.

That would also become the last transmission that I gave to mission control…

"This is Lieutenant Hawkins," I said while observing the planet from above, "how do you copy, over?"

"This is Mission Control;" said the director, "We can read you loud and clear, Lieutenant."

"How's the Bay Area looking?"

"Not good. Much of the Bay Area's taking heavy damage thanks to the Federation and Atlas."

"Say again, Command. We're losing your signal, over."

"The Federation broke the peace deal, and all Atlas assets are initiating Operation Bookshelf to defend the Bay Area. We need you on the ground immediately. I repeat. We need you to-"

"Negative. Hydraulics have taken heavy damage, along with the defense systems. Fortunately, the thrusters are still online, albeit severely damaged."

"Where are you and your crew heading to, over?"

"Parts unknown, we may head for the moon waiting for our lives to end or orbit across the earth or something. However, all I can say is that we've disturbed something that was hidden for too long, and it may pose a threat to the earth; immediate action may be needed to analyze the energy from the Six-Sided Event that happened back in 2004 in Germany. You need to heed the Doctor's warning over the damage that we've caused as a result."

"All of you must prepare for the future, because not only we're about to enter a new age, but we must unite together as one, and face off a greater threat that's been long dormant for so long. Singularity, out."


	4. Brave, New World (continued)

"All of you must prepare for the future, because not only we're about to enter a new age, but we must unite together as one, and face off a greater threat that's been long dormant for so long." That is what I exactly said towards mission control, once I looked at the surface, seeing faint lines of trailblazes coming from a cruise missile far from home. Not only that, but there are scores of explosions that rocked the Pacific Northwest, and Central America. But what did we actually do in making all this happen?

It was a tough question to ask about, now that we were about millions of miles away from the Earth overall. Moreover, I wasn't able to fully understand the truth about the war that was happing back home, since the last time the previous war occurred was weeks after the first war; and it was the defining moment that peace had fully returned between both worlds for the next 20 years or so. Fuck, man. I just wonder when all of this is coming to an end… *sigh* I just don't know why we have to be involved in such unnecessary wars that result in mass casualties along with their purposes as a whole…

**Homecoming**

Upon finishing my story and later returning to bed before midnight, I'd thought of something that's become such a rare oddity for such, as I remembered seeing some bleak images or so, picturing myself being with the same people that I met earlier fighting off against a greater threat that poised itself as a force to be reckoned with. I wasn't even sure if this premonition has to do something with the same people that I met. *sigh* I guess that it must've been an exhausting night for me, that I almost didn't sleep in overall.

I woke up about an hour before our guests would even arrive, as I made sure that everything was tidied up and was ready to take on a request that the pink-haired person aforementioned the previous afternoon. While mopping up the floor, overlooking at the Infinity being cloaked to blend itself from the environment, I heard a faint noise coming from the south, which gradually grew louder and landed about 10 meters away from the house, enough to blow the surrounding grass and other structures away from its radius.

By the time the helicopter had landed, it seemed as though, I would be expecting a welcoming committee, since it was literally the same crew that I briefly met before they took off. With all 8 of them leaving the helicopter, including the pilots themselves, I decided to become sarcastic at them, since they weren't aware that everybody except me was awake.

"Welcome, welcome!" I exclaimed to them, "It looks like you've awakened the entire house up!"

"Well, did we?" asked the medic.

Upon looking at her and the three others, I was stunned to find out that

"Wait! I thought you didn't work for any of the two that you talked about."

"Well, I didn't know that you'd be aware of this. How ya' guys doing?"

"Just had a quiet morning until the blades shook the whole house." I said to her. "What about our friend; is she going to make it alive?"

"Thankfully, she'll be making it out alive. She had some significant blood loss emanating from her brain and parts of her body. I'd say that she's already comatose at the moment. This is my squad commander. She'll be informing you about this little favor your friends had arranged with."

I looked at her pragmatic face while I heard the steps coming upstairs to discuss about our current state of affairs. She initially gave a keen look, analyzing some of the old patches that I wore during my time spent during the Joint Operation force, while the pink-haired woman maintained her distance away from the helicopter.

"Well then. You must be the same person that I met yesterday."

"You must be-."

"Journey, that's my call sign. My name's Rojas, warrant officer of the Escopian Global Ops team." She later paused for a moment and was able to look at way I was dressed, while I had my old helmet placed aside my right hip. She was reluctant at first, but later changed her mind and said, "You must be the Singularity, yes?"

"Yep." I replied before shaking her hand. "I'm Lieutenant Hawkins, former captain of the Type-3 crew."

"It must've been tough for you to lose a lot of your good friends, doing everything in your power to prevent the Federation in invading much of the homeland. Do you know by any chance that the Visitor's inside?"

"Like I said, you've awakened the entire house up, and they're gonna be whining about the engines of your helicopter making them piss on their apparels."

"Well, do give them my regards. Can my squad and I come in to your house?"

"This isn't a house, nor a cabin that used to host a ball or something, you know?"

"Hmph. Very funny. But maybe it could though, since this place's supposed to be some sort of fucking hotel or something."

"Well, hell if I know." She paused for a moment and looked at them. "Okay, then. Sergeant Artiaga, I need you to transmit the data Turk's sent to us now." *opens door and shows them our way into our room*

"Yeah, yeah…"

I opened the door so that they passed through, before I went upstairs to wake everybody up about them coming to see. Upon shaking a sleepy Visitor, he seemed to be unbothered by my shaking, since I was sure that he and Hana were night owl-ers, as I heard them doing their errands or play video games deep in the night amidst the serene woodlands that it brought.

I kept shaking him for about a minute or so before I gave up and instead went to Hana's bedroom after that. Upon quietly opening the rusty door, there was a foul smell that engulfed me and had to subsequently deal with it.

"Hey, Hana." I quietly mumbled to her while I was shaking her. "It's time to wake up."

I kept shaking her softly, since I was certain that overdoing it would make her instantly pissed off, before allowing herself to stretch for a moment and uncover herself from her blanket to take a shower in the midst of a windy morning.

"What time is it…?" she groggily asked while she was looking for her phone.

"It's seven in the morning." I replied before I looked at her pajamas and her drool she put all over her pillow before she grabbed her clothes and immediately went to the bathroom to take another quick, but warm shower.

"Where's the rest of the others?" she asked.

"Scientist's back at that base and near the beach town, gathering some more intel in regards to transmitting some of the files back to the Infinity."

"But I thought that the Infinity _was _destroyed!"

"Well so did I. But I wasn't aware that it'd be there. Now come on, and get ready."

"Yeah, yeah." Hana hastily replied before going in to the restroom.

I went downstairs to make some breakfast and prepare some coffee for the others to eat and drink, since it was going to be another day of work. Upon looking at a reluctant marine who was sitting besides the medic, he gave me a dismal look before I asked him about what he was thinking about.

"What's wrong?" I asked him while grabbing some food from the refrigerator.

"It's nothing," he replied. "It's just some things that I had to take care of, since we just came back from another mission last night."

"To where?"

"To tell you the truth, I actually forgot where we went. Only thing that I know is that we raided some fucking compound in the middle of nowhere that must've belonged to former members of the Federation or Atlas."

"Wait! You mean that the Federation's still-"?

"Relax. Look, nothing happened last night. It was just some documents that we uncovered shortly before this "Zero Point" or whatever the fuck it was called. Thankfully, they were just some asswipes claiming to be from either side, to tell you the truth."

"Well, Lieutenant," said Rojas while introducing me the other three that were sitting on the sofa, doing some wetwork in the process. "I forgot to introduce some of my team members! Let me introduce you to our rookie, Aritaga. He's a great kid, overall." *shows hand to the medic* "And _this_ is Remedy. Her real name's Fukanaga." *shows hand at the man* "And finally, my best man: Turk. His real name's Davidson."

The three later gave out their greetings to me, while I was making scrambled eggs. However, out of all the three that she introduced, it seemed to me that there was something strange with Artiaga, since I couldn't tell if he was in a bad mood or so. I asked Journey, "Is there anything wrong with him?"

"No, it's just he's a bit agitated after we had to go over through some pranksters thought to have been affiliated with either factions you've defeated." She replied before she began to eavesdrop to reveal his true colors. "Between you and me, he's a good kid; but at the same time, he can be annoying to talk to, since I _had _to learn the hard way." She later moves away from me and out of everything she chose to say to him, it when she decided to mock him. "Isn't that right, Sergeant?"

"Fuck you." He grudgingly said to her, while I was in the kitchen, cooking scrambled eggs for breakfast. "The only reason why you're talking shit to me is 'cause of what I said to you about their commander or so, having an organized unit and-"

"Goddammit, not now, Sergeant!" Rojas grinned at him in a grotesque manner, while she tried to look away from him.

"If it ain't me, then it's gotta be someone else that's gotta take the blame out of all the others."

"What's between you and him?" I asked her while cooking the scrambled eggs and looked at the fridge for additional food.

"Well, it's a long story." She replied to me as she looked at the refrigerator, looking for sausage. "Why don't we say this. You really know how to cook, don't you?"

"I mean yeah. Besides, I've been tired all night long trying to get some sleep after what I've been through. If I were you, then give him space to breathe through."

"I have to agree on what she said, commander." He interrupted.

"If you want, we can talk about it someday." Said Rojas while looking at I was cooking.

I looked at her once more, thinking that she might do something stupid. Feeling that she may have to do with something else, I decided to not say a thing or two before things would head south once more.

"I appreciate that your generosity," she said while looking at the refrigerated food that was ready to be cooked, "Do you want me to finish this, while you wake up our friend? I'll make you some breakfast for everybody to eat. It's my special that we eat in Mexico."

"Sure. And what is it?"

"It's some chorizo."

"What?" I confusedly asked at her. "What the fuck's chorizo."

"It's literally pork sausage enclosed with a special case that can be mashed over to make it with some eggs you're making. I think that you must've been mistaken in buying the wrong thing; but since I know how to make some, then I find it to be a great solution to make, even if you hate eating pork and meat in the morning. If you want, I can teach you some lessons on how to cook it."

"You sure about that?"

"Once this thing's over, then yeah. For now, try and wake up the Visitor. I'll have to set aside the eggs and place some new ones so that I could put the chorizo on the pan.  
"I'm on my way."

I went upstairs once again and to his bedroom, quietly tapping him in his helmet visor and whispering to him to wake up.  
"Hey!" I whispered to him while I quietly tapped his forehead. "Your friend's here. If I were you, I'd say it'd be a good time to wake up _right _nowand talk to your friend."

He was reluctant to wake up, but it wasn't until that I had enough of his antics in trying to wake him up that I started violently shaking him and raised my voice to him to wake up and get ready.

"Uhhhh!" he moaned disgustedly. "I need some extra sleep."

"I'm sorry…" I replied sarcastically to him, "but your friends from EGO showed up, and they want you to be downstairs by now."

"You're not serious, are you?"

I grabbed him by each arm and shaked him while saying, "You son of a bitch! You think I'm playing around?!"

"I don't know what got you in this mood."

Moments after waking him up, I went downstairs and into the kitchen to check on the scrambled eggs and the chorizo that Rojas made, which made my stomach rumble and the food would attract my attention. By the time I sat at the kitchen table, Rojas served me the food that she made before the rest would come downstairs or return home after finishing up their routine.

About a minute or so, I was trying to savor some of the scrambled eggs that was covered with chorizo and some tortillas aside. I know that I've never liked nor tried to eat any of that stuff, but asked her if this was her daily.

"I know every detail on how to make chorizo with eggs," she replied while cooking, "I remember my mama making it for us once my brother and I came home from school." *deep sigh and later smiles* "Yep, those were the good times…"

"What happened to your family?" I asked her.

"I don't know anything about my little Luis, but my mother's fine," she replied before she gave out a sigh and started feeling a bit sad. "I don't where he's at right now. I fear that he's been long dead. You knew about the Federation, right?"

"Yeah. A friend of mine said that her father knew about the man himself."

"Who? Captain Ramirez?"

"You mean Roxanne?"

"Oh, her… I didn't know that you've met each other in person. She's with me right now. If you want, I can bring her over and let you guys chat while we sort this out."

"It's okay." I looked at the food once again, and ripped off a part of the tortilla to try the pork sausage mixed with the scrambled eggs. Upon having my first taste, it initially felt an awkward sensation, since it tasted a bit sour but it was soft enough, that my taste buds were able to adjust itself and tasted delicious. I ate the rest of the mixed food and decided to grab another at full hand, while Hana exited and gave an awry look at the both of us while standing next to me.

While I was waiting for him to return back, I started to think about the baby Cattus once more, since the last time I saw the baby was when he being taken care of by one of the Sentinels onboard the capital ship. I was poignant enough to ask her, "You said that you were onboard the Infinity with us when it all happened, right?" all the while she was cooking.

"Okay… I don't where you're getting me into. If anything, I wasn't supporting the Federation at the time, since EGO's an independent organization that stemmed off from the government itself shortly before you had to deal with it." *looks at me* "What are trying to do?"

"Nothing." *suddenly becomes nervous at her* "Th-there's nothing wrong about what you did back there. I just wanted to ask you if you've seen this before."

I showed her a picture of the baby shortly after I finished with the breakfast she prepared, with the others sitting in the sofa, doing some work on the computer, or just doing something else. It took about a while to waits for a response from her, while the Visitor and Scientist returned from doing their errands.

I continued looking towards her, before she was able to give out a response.

"Oh, this. I've just seen him this morning."

"Really? Then obviously, you must know about-"

"The fact that this thing's supposed to be the last of the Devourer, huh?" *keeps looking at the picture and later puts it aside* "About the way it's supposed to be named, I feel that Cattus doesn't fit well, since he's supposed to look a lot like a cat, then?"

"_That_ thing is supposed to be the Devourer's son?"

"Quite frankly, yes. Now obviously, it wasn't me that named Cattus as the Devourer; but I do feel that it's a bit off." *looks at the Visitor while preparing to eat breakfast* "Well, then? Shall we get started with the briefing?"

"Sure thing." He nodded.

"All right, then. Jennifer, let Hana and the Scientist know that they'd like to see them and have them talk."

"I'm on it." I went upstairs to tell them the exact things the Visitor said. While Hana finished checking up on herself and the Scientist uncovering additional papers that they found yesterday, I remained stoked over the choices I was making, since I began having a grudge with the Visitor over what he said to us, as I walked downstairs with them and wondered if all this was going to end…

**30 minutes later…**

I waited for the rest of the others having breakfast, while I was inside my room surveilling some documents belonging to a foreign organization that was left behind. In one of the documents covering some classified information about the organization, I was intrigued by the absolute secrecy that it talked about, since it covered a new type of weapon thought to be an entirely radical concept. I kept reading about the experiment, but I started to become stoic by the time I realized the classified documents must've belonged to the Federation, since it dated back towards the 1990s.

I wasn't sure if this must've belonged to one of Rojas's men, but I eventually learned that this program was thought to have been Orchard all along, since I remembered one of the scientists, Dr. Yanez, I believe, talking about the project back during its hayday. It must've been so long for the entire format to be exposed entirely. But at the same time, I was worried enough about our fate of this new land, as I started to become suspicious and felt that I needed to closely monitor what these guys may be planning on doing.

In order to do so, I used an image scanner to upload the entire document format while the others were eating, including those that were onboard the helicopter and placed it all in a hard drive enclosed in my visor helmet and concealed it as a whole, before she came in knocking on the door, stating that it was time…

With one of the crew members escorting me downstairs to where the meeting occurred, I remained stoic about the whole thing, as I aforementioned earlier about what I said. But with everything that was about to unfold, I soon found out that I had to put my ambitions on hold and find out about their true intentions before it was too late.

"What's the current situation?" asked the Visitor, while he was sipping some tea.

"Nothing much," Rojas hastily replied. She later shows us some pictures and the UAV feed that was gathered a few days earlier via her laptop. "I was a click west from where the meeting was happening. Thankfully, my fellow agent Turk was able to gather as much intel as needed." She later closes her laptop and looks at her hand to remove a microchip that came imbedded in her gloves before installing it into her goggles to display the data on the wall.

I was amazed by how her goggles were able to display all of the exact on a small accessory; and with these stark innovations, I'm certain that we may be living in the future after all, because of how high-tech our bodies are starting to become. God knows what he may put on hold to us. Maybe we may have all the information right on our fucking brains, and make it seem that much of our bodies have been integrated with cybernetic augmentation.

"This here, is Steamy Stacks. Now I know it's been around before I was born; but one thing that stoked me here the most was how our engineers safely processed a new type of energy originally emitted from the Six-Sider. If I do recall, this power plant was nuclear-based; but for safety reasons, it had to be temporarily closed due to arising fears that it could've faced a nuclear meltdown, should a natural disaster occur at any time…"

"Right, but are you sure that it's sustainable? And if so, then are you sure that it will _not _cause a meltdown?" I asked her.

"Geez, how many questions can _I _answer?" she replied. "According to them, they were able to research some of its sample cells gathered upon the aftermath of the Nexus phenomenon. Which means-"

"It happened some 30-35 years ago, according to one of my commanding officers," interrupted Hana, while Rojas was amazed as to when it occurred. "according to my captain, she states that the Nexus phenomenon took place around the time the new century had started. It was thought that this occurred about 31 kilometers southwest from Busan."

"What? You mean there was another phenomenon taking place over there?!" I asked in shock, while I looked across the room to find that none of them didn't give a fuck…

"Pretty much." *looks at me before closing her eyes and hugs herself*

"But… but how didn't the… how didn't the UN become aware of it?"

"The UN and the ACD (Asia Cooperation Dialogue) subsequently knew that this was going to happen, since there were multiple Nexus phenomena that occurred over remote parts of the Eurasian continent," commented Hana before showing us an old document containing information about that said event, "And because of this, an agreement was made between all organizations in secret that in case a Nexus phenomenon should ever take place, then it was certain that the world's nations would have to cooperate in building a prosperous world."

"Wait, how do you know about this?" asked Rojas while reading some of her agent files obtained from an older flash drive.

"I've been living over there for nearly 20 years or so, but I wasn't able to live through all of it, since I was born 20 years after this happened." Upon pausing for a moment, Hana showed to us a picture showing Gwishin at the time we faced off the Federation.

"What you are looking at are what was left of Gwishin, a product of the Initiative, a government project launched by my government to build state of the art technologies thought to have never been useful. And with that, it was capable of self-producing omnics capable of aerial combat with manned and unmanned weaponry."

"Now that you're talking about Gwishin, uh, Hana, would you try and be specific about the omnics, first of all?" asked Journey.

"I'm getting there," Hana replied to her, "The omnics that I engaged during the skirmish in Busan contained a miniature warhead yielding Federation-spec chemicals that I didn't even thought of, since I was initially skeptical that it must've come from one of our nearby countries or Talon, which I believe they were allied with the Federation."

"If so, then how did you know that it _was _them?"

"I wasn't aware about the Federation trying to gain their influence here on Earth," *points her hand at the Visitor* "…but it was them that told me about the Federation and Atlas in the first place." Hana later places both of her hands in the table, while trying to recollect some of the additional details that came to her mind, while I patiently sat there, thinking about what she was going to say.

"Back to what I was saying" I said to her, "Are you sure that one of your agents or recon assets are dealing with this? Because if so, does that mean that we'll be facing up a scenario containing specs similar to Orchard during the first war?"

"Currently, we're on top of this situation at this moment," she replied. "I may ask you to join us on a mission at the request of our commander callsign: Midas. Not only do we need you to infiltrate the facility inside, but we also need to confirm whether or not, ATLER has the means in mobilizing their troops and immediately launch a preemptive strike against our fleet scattered across the continent."

"And if we don't?"

"It's only a matter of time right now that we deal with this now, or tensions are going to escalate and it may intensify into an all-out war." Rojas turned her holographic display back on and showed to us their maps of the power plant and caches of canisters containing napalm or the new weapon alone, followed by a number of transporters and tactical vehicles patrolling the munitions plant.

"Are you _sure_ that's all the information that you have at the moment?" I asked her anxiously while looking directly at the large display screen, "Because if that's all that you have at the moment, then already, ALTER will be planning on mobilizing their forces in no time."

"So, then? Will that be a yes?"

I anxiously nodded for a moment while looking at the others being impatient about being here for nearly an hour or so, waiting to get a response back. I stood up and went to get some fresh air before seeing the Visitor come right besides me as the morning breeze had begun to fade away in favor of a storm starting to brew immediately deep in the south. I kept staring at the forest nearby along with the storm moving close to where we were.

While I was looking at the balcony, the Visitor started chanting or mumbling about something that must've him, since I wasn't fully aware of his past except for the roles he played in those three wars that occurred. I somehow felt a bit weird seeing him go through this, but this must've been related to all the approaches he made, since I felt that much of the choices that we've went through must've engulfed him. I felt bad trying to look away from him, but I still had my tempers from yesterday, since I didn't know about our new enemies that we made; and I had to be sure I made the right decision, otherwise those same allies that we've fought alongside could turn their backs on us.

I looked at him once again, thinking about the entire thing going smooth before I patted him in the back and asked him, "Are you sure you're making the right choice? Because I don't want a repeat of what happened when Atlas betrayed us for disobeying orders."

"I understand, Captain," he replied, "But it's not how should work. I made that deal with her and told them about us not being caught in the middle of the crossfire."

"Honestly, I don't anything else to happen to you. But this is about the fate of the people that lived under oppression of any faction that gained control over a specified area. And I feel that whatever choice you're making, I only want to save those that have been oppressed, not those that are in favor of working for the enemy."

"Thank you for your concern. I'll do my best to not lose as many comrades as we possibly can, because if we do, then I can make the other lives easier by being a complete idiot and actually sacrifice myself to join the others for my valiant effort." *looks at EGO insignia at the helicopter* "I feel that it's important to join them and stop this madness from ensuing."

"Then it means we'll start actually fighting off ALTER? Not EGO? As I said, it's your choice in joining them or the others."

"It seems so," he says while looking at the darkness starting to thicken over the crisp forest in the background, "We'll have to join them overall, and check to see that they're really our allies, since I think they may be looking over the document that was left on the desk yesterday."

"Right. But I have the real one in my hard drive enclosed in my helmet," I said, "We just need to make sure that they won't be doing anything else stupid besides dealing with the threat we'll be dealing with in the future."

"Whatever it is, Captain, I thank you for sticking with me through the direst of times. Now let's head downstairs and accept the request."

By the time we made it back to the meeting room, I could only find a more reserved Journey waiting for the request to join us before seeing the others starting to board the helicopters outside. I had the urge of not joining, but given that I had to deal with this one last time, then I had to do it for the sake that Hana and the others would survive, since I wasn't sure about where the rest of our Sentinels were at the moment.

"What do you say?" she asked at us.

"We'll be willing to join you on this mission," I replied, "but on one condition. If this turns out to be a trap for us, then know this: we'll have no other choice but to withdraw in the future and place you on NATO's watchlist. You can count on that."

"Very well. I shall fulfill that deed in being truthful to our knowledge and know that we shall not break that promise you made. Now my men are boarding the helicopter and are waiting for me to get onboard. I only ask of you to join us and brief you over the situation more while we get to our GHQ."


End file.
